Jimmy Strolls 'em Off in Extras: Phillies 5, Marlins 4

Jimmy Rollins.

Hell yeah.

I guess I have to actually write a little about the other things. Jonathan Pettibone made his season debut today, and pitched a workmanlike five innings (workmanlike is an oddly unambiguous descriptor), scattering eight hits and two runs, while striking out five.

One of the hits was pretty impressive, though, and deserves special mention.

Giancarlo Stanton.

Hell yeah.

I mean, I'm a pretty biased observer here, right? Go Phils, boo other teams. But it's really tough for me to get upset over a homerun like that. I mean, damn. A distance of 470' makes it a bit short of the Citizen's Bank OFJOAB distance record of sixteen miles (Evan Gattis), but still quite impressive.

Marlins' starter Nathan Eovaldi started off shakily, allowing two runs each in the first and third innings. In the first, the Phils struck quickly, with a double off the bat of Tony Gwynn Jr, a single by Rollins to score Gwynn and a double from Chase Utley scoring Rollins. In the third, Gwynn led off again with a single, moved to second on a groundout, and scored on another double from Utley.

Chase Utley, by the way, is hitting .472 this year, and, after hitting in all nine games this year, is on a 14-game hitting streak. Hell yeah. Chase Utley is the best.

Pettibone was relieved by Justin De Fratus, who, after a relatively clean sixth, came back out for the seventh and allowed a leadoff single to Marcell Ozuna, bringing up Stanton again.

I want to take a minute to talk about how goddamn boss Giancarlo Stanton is. I mean, we made jokes about Roy Halladay and his laser eyes, or whatever, but Giancarlo Stanton is actually a terminator from the future, sent back to murder baseballs. James Cameron actually based the Terminator movies on Giancarlo Stanton's hitting prowess. Ruben, if you're reading this, please trade for that guy.

Anyway, where was I?

Oh, yes. Stanton. Stanton drilled a De Fratus meatball so hard to left that you have to be 18 years old to watch the clip. It blasted its way through the side of Citizens' Bank Park, achieved escape velocity, and is minutes away from catching up with the Pioneer 10. Wow.

After that ruckus, things settled down somewhat. Mario Hollands cleaned up the seventh; Antonio Bastardo struggled through an awkward, if clean, eighth; and Jonathan  Benghazi pitched a Mitch Williams-esque ninth. Meanwhile, Eovaldi quieted down the Phils into the seventh, and relievers A.J. Ramos, Mike Dunn, Carlos Marmol took the game to the tenth, and Dan Jennings...

...where, with two outs and no one on base, Jimmy Rollins blasted his second career walk off homerun--and proceeded to yell "shut the fuck up" at someone who'd been heckling him.

Hell yeah.

Fangraph of Strollin' Home One Win Richer

Source: FanGraphs

I want to add that the strike zone today was awful; easily the worst I've seen this year. Lance Barksdale is a terrible umpire. I'm not gonna say I could do better, since I have terrible eyesight, but piece of plywood would be a better pitch-caller than Lance Barksdale. Seriously, MLB, you gotta do something about this. You "fixed" the lack of replay, you "fixed" the All-Star game, you "fixed" the lack of playoff teams. Please "fix" Lance Barksdale.